Editing Ulster Volunteer Force (section)

===Strength===
The strength of the UVF is uncertain. The first [[Independent Monitoring Commission]] report in April 2004 described the UVF/RHC as "relatively small" with "a few hundred" active members "based mainly in the Belfast and immediately adjacent areas".<ref name="cain.ulst.ac.uk"/> Historically, the number of active UVF members in July 1971 was stated by one source to be no more than 20.<ref name="boulton144">Boulton, p. 144,</ref> Later, in September 1972, Gusty Spence said in an interview that the organisation had a strength of 1,500.<ref name="cusack102">Cusack & McDonald, p. 102</ref> A British Army report released in 2006 estimated a peak membership of 1,000.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.vilaweb.cat/media/attach/vwedts/docs/op_banner_analysis_released.pdf |title=AC 71842 Operation BANNER |website=Vilaweb.cat |access-date=2017-06-23 |archive-date=3 March 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303215447/http://www.vilaweb.cat/media/attach/vwedts/docs/op_banner_analysis_released.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> Information regarding the role of women in the UVF is limited. One study focusing in part on female members of the UVF and [[Red Hand Commando]] noted that it "seem[ed] to have been reasonably unusual" for women to be officially asked to join the UVF.<ref>Alison, Miranda, ''Women and Political Violence: Female Combatants in Ethno-National Conflict'', Routledge, 2009, p. 160, {{ISBN|978-0415592420}}</ref> Another estimates that over a 30-year period women accounted for, at most, just 2% of UVF membership.<ref>McEvoy, Sandra, ''Gender and International Security: Feminist Perspectives'', Routledge, 2009, p. 134, {{ISBN|978-0415475792}},</ref>